Cinderella
by Tyler AM
Summary: The tell tale sound of feet on the hard wood of the dining room makes a smile stretch across his lips. She should be in bed and he should be angry with her and tell her to go straight back upstairs…but he never can resist those bright blue eyes.


**A/N: one of the things I ADORE about Castle is Rick and Alexis' relationship. My father and I are very close so it makes me genuinely happy to see a network show depict such a great father/daughter relationship. It's not perfect - nothing ever is - but it is beautiful. **

**That's sort of where this came from - little moments of Rick and Alexis Castle. Hope you** **enjoy!**

_Disclaimer - ahhhhhhh if only :)_

* * *

I'll dance with Cinderella while she is here in my arms

Cause I know something the Prince never knew

I'll dance with Cinderella I don't want to miss even one song

Cause all too soon the clock with strike midnight

And she'll be gone

"Cinderella" by Steven Curtis Chapman

~~XX~~

He sits hunched over his keyboard – the click of his fingers hitting the keys a strange rhythm in the stillness of the loft surrounding him. It has almost been too quite ever since…he shakes his head to try and erase the thoughts that keep trying to form and drag him down. _Have to let it go, Rick_, he chides himself and returns to Derrick Storm. But for some reason, his mind will not focus and he saves his document out of habit, places his elbows on his desk and rests his head in his hands. He takes in a deep breath and lets his shoulders sag under the weight he has been carrying around for months now.

The tell tale sound of feet on the hard wood of the dining room makes a smile stretch across his lips. She should be in bed and he should be angry with her and tell her to go straight back upstairs…but he never can resist those bright blue eyes. The steps stop abruptly and he knows she is at the door to his study – he leaves the door open when he is writing late at night just in case – and waits for just a moment, seeing if she will come into the room.

After a second's hesitation, the foot steps begin to move again and soon he feels her presence at his side. She dips her head under his arms and her round eyes, so bright in the stilted darkness, snag his heart and squeeze it.

"You ok, daddy?" Her sweet voice whispers harshly into the night.

"I'm ok, pumpkin." He says lightly as he drops his hands and wraps one arm around his daughter's tiny form. "What are doing out of bed, huh? It's after eleven."

"No sleep…" Alexis yawns, her eyes closing and her mouth opening wide as she leans against her father's thigh.

"Yes, sleep. It's late and you have to be up to spend time with grandma tomorrow."

"Gram coming?" Those eyes so full of hope but also uncertainty clinch his chest and he drops a quick kiss to her temple.

"Yes, honey, Gram is coming. She's taking you to breakfast and then shopping for a while and maybe even the park if you're up for it…"

"Carousel?"

"I'm sure your Gram would LOVE to take you on the Carousel." He states emphatically, attempting to conjure up some joy to plaster on his face for his almost five-year-old little girl. She smiles back at him, completely accepting of his statement of facts, and lets her head rest back against his thigh again. _Her hair is getting long_, he thinks as he runs his hand through the ginger locks and decides he will call up the hairdresser in the morning while Alexis is with his mother and schedule it.

"The castle too, daddy?" She sighs into his leg.

"I'm sure the castle too, baby." He can feel her smile into his leg – all chubby cheeked and perfect baby teeth because she has not started to lose them yet. He places his hand under her chin and lifts her head up so he can look her in the eyes.

"Time for bed, pumpkin."

"I'm not tired."

"Then why are you yawning?"

"I'm not…yaw…yawning." She stutters as her mouth opens wide in another yawn. "Daddy…?" Alexis asks as she straightens herself and Castle stands from his desk chair.

"Yes?" He reaches down and grabs her offered hand and they begin to walk toward the staircase. Once in the living room he feels a slight tug on his hand. He stops and turns to see his daughter standing in the middle of the living room smiling gently up at him. "What is it, pumpkin?"

"Are there princes and princesses at the castle?" He smiles.

"What do you think?"

"I think there are! And I think they watch over all the people who are in the park and…"

"And…" He gently prods as he kneels down to be level with her.

"And maybe…they invite people to come in and play with them?"

"Maybe they do."

"Daddy…"

"What?"

"Help me dance?" She looks up at him with hopeful eyes set into an expression that he wishes he could erase from her completely – disappointment, resignation. At four she can only expect that she will be disappointed, told _no, never_ and sent up to bed because it is too late. "Please, daddy?" Her voice is so sweet and small and he caves. He knows he is a pushover but it has been hard without her mother around. So he smiles, leans forward to press a kiss to her forehead before standing tall and lifting her up. He sets her down on top of his feet and begins to waltz slowly around the silence of their living room. Who cares if it is almost midnight?

~~XX~~

She came running into the loft, red hair flying all around her, blue eyes shinning in her face, voice high pitched and screaming. _He asked me, dad. He asked me!_ God when had she gotten old enough to be asked to prom?

He said yes, of course, and she ran upstairs still screaming. He likely should meet the guy he is allowing to whisk his daughter off into the night for this sordid ritual of teenage 'normalcy'. He actually really needs to own a gun. He should talk to Beckett about that. They finished dress shopping last night; he helped close the case at the twelfth, and now he is sitting in his study wishing he had something else to occupy his mind besides the fact that his little girl is going to prom.

The clearing of a throat jolts him from his thoughts – his lap top almost falls off his lap but he catches it in the nick of time – and he looks toward the doorway of his study to see Alexis standing in front of him. Her arms are crossed over her chest, her hair falling down in a red river along her back, little wisps falling over her shoulders and her eyes – those blue eyes – staring him down.

"Everything ok, pumpkin?"

"Yeah, everything's fine, dad."

"Shouldn't you be getting ready for the dance?" He asks as he looks at the clock.

"Still have a couple hours." She says plainly as she walks further into the room and comes up to rest her hip at the edge of his desk looking down at where he still sits in his desk chair.

"Well, anything I can do to help?"

"Actually, there is something…if you wouldn't mind?" She is doing that thing she sometimes does with him where her head is actually tilted down just a bit but her eyes are looking up at him – makes her look all bashful…just like the dwarf. And it makes her eyes shine in the lamp light. She bites her bottom lip just slightly as she regards him.

"Anything for you." She smiles and extends her hand to him.

"Dance with me, daddy?" His heart stops beating for a moment as he places his hand in hers – when did her hands get so big? They are still dwarfed by his, sure, but he cannot seem to pin point when her hand began filling his. He swallows past the lump that forms in his throat as she walks them into the living room and turns to him. She places her hand on his shoulder and his goes to her waist and they begin to sway.

~~XX~~

The light from the lamp on his desk refracts harshly against his eyelids. He shuts his eyes tighter, trying so hard just to drown out the light and keep it from splitting his head open. Seven weeks. It has been seven weeks and now he has been sitting here for six hours drowning his emotions in two bottles of whiskey. Wait, nope, three bottles. Ugh, he wants to throw up. The pounding in his head begins to intensify – a staccato rhythm beating into the very depths of his soul and he starts to wonder if this is what it feels like when despair and death coming knocking on your door. Literally knocking. God, it is SO loud.

"Dad." Her voice is imploring. He does not answer. "Dad!" She practically screams it in his ear and he startles, the bottle he is holding crashes to the floor as he reaches his hands up and grabs his head. Why is it so bright in here? "Dad, what is going on?"

"Wha…?" He tries to open his eyes to look at his daughter but he cannot force his eyes to open. Too bright. Just turn it all off.

"Dad, can you hear me?"

"'Lesis…" He slurs and reaches out a hand in the general direction where he thinks her voice is coming from. He feels his hand come into contact with something soft and warm and he holds onto it tighter. So soft…so soft and he just wants to turn off all the lights and the sounds and never turn them on again. Just lay here in the darkness. Cause that is all he sees when he opens his eyes any way – it is only darkness. Seven weeks of radio silence.

"Dad, come on. You're going to bed." He feels himself being lifted and then he is leaning against something solid, strong – when did his little girl get so strong? He drags his feet along the hardwood floor the air conditioning cooling the surface just perfectly in the early-July heat and he seriously considers dropping onto the floor right here and just dying. Just letting it all drag him under the surface and never come up. He could do it…he really could.

He feels his body come into contact with the softest surface he can ever remember feeling and the darkness overtakes him.

When he wakes the next morning his head is pounding. He sits up, too quickly, and he runs from his bed into the bathroom barely making it to the toilet before the contents of his marathon pity session are brought up from his stomach and leaves him gasping – maybe it is sobbing – on the tile floor. Eventually he pulls himself up and walks out of the bathroom, stumbles when he reaches the door to his study, moves through it and the room into the breaking light of the midday in the living room beyond. The melodic voices that reach his ears are low and something else he cannot place right now because the light is BLINDING and oh, screw this, he is just going to turn right back around and go back to bed. Back to the dark.

He starts to turn when her voice stops him in his tracks.

"You're alive." Her voice is low and cold. She is angry, he can tell.

"Yeah, barely." He gives a low chuckle and finds that even that hurts so he stops. He opens his eyes just enough to be able to make out Alexis' form in front of him but not enough to be sent spiraling from the jagged edges of pain that the light creates in his brain. She really is angry. He can see it all over her face.

"Alexis…" He begins.

"What the hell, dad?" Before he can respond she holds her hand up to him. "No, I have no idea what that bender was last night or what you were trying to do…"

"Alexis…what are you talking about?" He asks before her voice can get any louder, any higher and pierce any further into his brain.

"You really don't remember?" She scoffs. _What in the world is her problem_, he thinks, _I just had a few drinks…_

"I…" He sighs and his shoulders sag. He really does not want to be doing this right now.

"Dad turn around and look in your study. Gram and I left it exactly like it was yesterday when we came home and found you." He turns around at her supplication and stumbles into his study. His eyes are getting clearer and the light is not hurting as badly but he still has to squint a bit to keep it from ripping his head in two. That actually does not sound half bad right now – his head can follow his heart…that would be a change for once. He brings his hand up to his eyes, pinches them slightly to try and clear the fuzziness around the edges of his vision and then opens his eyes again. The sight almost makes him run from the room.

It is a disaster. Not only the bottles of whiskey, but paper everywhere. Getting closer he realizes it is not just paper – it is all the information he has on the case. Everything he could scrounge up on the bank, on the cops…on her. He feels Alexis leave his side and he turns toward her following her out of the room. She stops in the middle of the living room – God it was not that long ago they would dance around this room together, not a care in the world – and turns to him, eyes fiery and hands on her hips…staring him down.

"Alexis, look, I…"

"Save it! Save the explanations and the cover stories and the 'this is work' excuse, ok. I'm sick of hearing it! I came home last night and found you…" She stops and takes in a shaky breath. He can see her fighting back tears – her eyes are just starting to rim red. "I thought you were dead or something, dad. Do you know what that feels like? To walk in to your own home and find the one person who means everything to you lying completely unresponsive on the floor surrounded by liquor bottles?"

"Sweetheart, I'm so…"

"I know, dad. I know you're sorry. But that's just not enough." She stops and he can see her calculating her next words carefully. He wonders what is about to come out of her mouth. "It's about Detective Beckett isn't it?" He cannot even answer her. He cannot lie to his daughter – at least he tries not to and not in his current state – so he just lowers his eyes from her all to knowing gaze and that is answer enough.

"Look, dad. I know that you love her. But you know what…" She breaks. He can hear it in her voice, the way it cracks as the tears begin to fall and run red rivers down her porcelain cheeks. He feels the movement a moment before she is in front of him and placing her hands on either side of his face, forcing his to look her in the eye. "I love you…I need you. Please don't take my daddy away from me."

She lets him go and practically runs up the stairs before he can answer. He takes in a breath, forces the air down into his lungs and turns toward the windows along the wall of the living room. The light still hurts – it is knifing into every chasm of his being – but he lets it hurt. Lets it carve out all the hollow spaces that she once filled and fill it back up with the memories before her. Lets the sound of her laugh, the smell of her skin, the sensation of her touch be carved out of him piece by piece. And then he picks himself up and climbs the stairs to his daughter's bedroom. Because his little girl needs him.

~~XX~~

_A father would do anything for his daughter_. The words he spoke barely a month ago to Kate echo around his head as he holds onto Alexis. The fear he experienced when he realized she was missing was like nothing he had ever experienced – the only thing he can even remotely correlate with it was holding Kate's body as the life drained out of her in that cemetery.

"Dad?"

"Yeah pumpkin?"

"If we get home…"

"When we get home." He corrects her, his heart constricting to hear the panic in his little girl's voice.

"When…can I stay with you? At the loft?" Her voice is so small, almost fearful he will turn down the request. He can feel her sobbing noiselessly into his chest as he holds her tighter, tighter, not tight enough.

"You know you can." He responds. God, how are they ever going to get out of this?

~~XX~~

It is late spring when Alexis comes into the loft. Her hair is a bit shorter than it has been for the past few years – just a couple inches – but it makes her look older than her 21 years which he does not like in the slightest. She smiles widely as she hugs Kate in greeting and takes the cup of coffee offered to her before sitting in the couch next to her step-mother. He cannot help the smile that breaks across his face at the sight of them – knees practically touching as they talk.

"The staring is forever creepy, Castle." Kate's voice wafts into his senses and he startles, looking toward them both as they smile at him.

"Yes but good creepy…because it's me!"

"Sure, dad, keep telling yourself that!"

"So what was it you wanted to talk to us about?" Kate asks, turning back toward Alexis.

"I'm not completely sure how to say it…so…" Alexis stutters before taking a breath and exhaling. As she does she raises her left hand into the sunlight where the light refracts off the ring into prisms of dancing rainbow colors along the walls. Kate's eyes go wide and she gasps as she reaches over to grab hold of Alexis' hand. Kate reaches across the couch and wraps both arms around Alexis holding her tightly. Once Kate releases her, Alexis shifts her gaze to where her father stands next to her.

"I'm so happy for you, sweetheart!" Castle exclaims as he leans down to wrap his arms around his daughter. His phone ringing in his office startles him and he leaves Kate and Alexis on the couch chatting about the wedding plans that have already been made, dates for wedding dress shopping, how Alexis wants to do her hair, etc etc. He closes the door but does not shut it as he answers the phone. Once he hangs up, he sits down in his chair and finds himself looking right at the photo. It was taken when Alexis was only, geez five or six. They are walking away from the photographer and Alexis is reaching up to hold his hand as they walk down the pathway to a playground in the distance. How did the time go by so quickly?

He feels her presence at the door before she speaks, just like he always does.

"Dad?"

"Hm?" He hums as he lifts his head to meet her eyes. She smiles when their gazes lock and she moves into the room.

"We set a tentative date for October."

"That sounds lovely."

"Yeah, we both really love New York in the fall. Thought it would be perfect."

"It will be."

"But there is one thing…" She says as she reaches his desk and places her hip against the edge. He smiles at the all too familiar move.

"What one thing?"

"Father-Daughter dance." She raises her eyebrows at him and he reaches towards her grabbing hold of her left hand with his right. "And you really should practice." He laughs and stands. She wraps her arms around his waist and rests her head on his chest. His arm encircle her shoulders as he places his cheek on her head and breathes in the scent of his daughter – so different than it was when she was little. He pulls back from her and places a kiss on her forehead.

"Please, daddy?" He purses his lips for a moment, looking like he is considering her proposal and she slaps his arm. They smile and he takes her hand in his, raises it up to his lips and places a soft kiss on it. He bows to her dramatically and she giggles.

"May I have this dance, my lady?"

"You may, kind sir." She curtsies to him and walks him out into the living room which he notices is empty. "Kate went upstairs to check on Alex." Alexis says in explanation to the question in his eyes. Castle smiles and wraps his arm around his daughter's slim waist, hers coming to rest on his shoulder – and they sway. He catches a glimpse of the clock on the wall – it is almost midnight.

* * *

_I am planning a follow up - but I will likely post as a different story as it will not be Rick/Alexis...but it was inspired by the same song :) Stay tuned!_


End file.
